Annual Butler Farm Show to proceed ‘as normal’
Despite the Saturday, July 13, shooting at the Butler Farm Show grounds during the rally for former President Donald Trump, the Butler Farm Show — the August event and the entry process leading up to the weeklong affair — will proceed “as normal,” according to the farm show’s board of directors.
While the organization is cooperating with law enforcement investigating the shooting, which killed a Buffalo Township man, grazed Trump’s ear and injured two other men, the board of directors is making plans for the annual event, board president Ken Laughlin said Monday.
“There will be no change to the farm show at all,” Laughlin said.
The board of directors scheduled a special meeting for Tuesday evening to regroup after the shooting and discuss security details for the event, which is scheduled to begin Aug. 5.
According to Laughlin, the farm show grounds only served as the venue for the rally, so its organizers rented the space just like any other organization or event would at the grounds. The Butler Farm Show itself is an event planned by the board of directors to take place at the Connoquenessing Township venue, where it has annually since 1960.
Entrances to the farm show were still blocked off by police and caution tape Monday, July 15.
The farm show event recently extended its deadline for entries, a decision which Ken Metrick, secretary of the farm show board of directors, said was made when Trump’s rally was scheduled for the grounds.
All animal entries will be accepted through Friday, July 19, at Metrick’s Harvest View Farm & Market, 143 Eagle Mill Road, daily from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m.
Metrick also said the organization has extended the deadline for past farm show events, to make the process easier for the youths who plan to enter this year’s competitions.
“When they were setting up over there, it was hectic, and with everything going on, they had so much equipment, so many people,” Metrick said. “We thought just for the kids' sake we would extend it.”
The farm show has been surrounded by police and news vehicles since Saturday, and Laughlin said it may be some time before law enforcement agencies wrap up their investigations of the incident.
“There is every type of investigator under the sun,” Laughlin said.
